Friendly fennel

Tell me something…what you would like to have at the end of a scrumptious meal to feel completely satiated. Yes, you are right, mukhwas which is what is generally served at the end of a meal. Ah yes, now you may say a paan is served more often. Yes indeed it is, but there are some who cannot or do not prefer to eat a paan. So, for them the ideal mukhwas would be saunf, which could be lightly roasted and served with small sugar crystals.

That is not all, saunf or fennel seeds or aniseeds are used to flavour many a dish. Actually fennel and aniseed are different, though many think both of them are the same. Let’s know the difference.

What is fennel

Fennel, belonging to the Parsley family, has two varieties with the botanical names, Foeniculum vulgare and Foeniculum vulgare dulce. The former is mainly used to extract oil where the latter is also grown for its edible bulb, apart from oil and seeds. These fennels can grow from two to five feet tall.

It would come as a surprise to you that saunf is not a seed but a fruit. The greener it is better, is its quality. I can recall nostalgic memories of school days when we used to buy sheafs of fresh fennel from the vendor outside out school gates and pluck seed by seed and munch on them.

What is aniseed

Anise has the botanical name Pimpinella anisum and is a native to Greece and Egypt. Anise grows smaller than fennel, about eighteen inches tall. Though the seeds of anise and fennel are somewhat similar; both the seeds are oval in shape, but unlike fennel, aniseeds have a sweet spicy flavour. Another difference is when anise ripen, they get a gray-green colour whereas ripened fennel seeds have a brown colour.

Medicinal properties

According to Ayurveda, saunf is cooling and soothing and excellent remedy for stomach upsets. This is perhaps why it is served as mukhwas at the end of a meal. It is also added along with supari to the paan, which is also served at the end of a meal. Among the two varieties, patli saunf is sweeter than the thicker one which is known as valayati saunf. The former is generally used as mukhwas and the latter in cooking.

Both the anise and fennel seeds are widely used in traditional medicines. Both of them are known to help in the production of breast milk, ease pain during delivery and improve digestion so recommended to pregnant and lactating women. They also help in curing bronchitis, constipation, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, head lice and coughs.

Soak a tablespoon of fennel seeds in a cup of water overnight and clean your eyes with that water which would help to cure puffy eyes and sore eyes. Fennel water also helps in curing pain and cramps during menstruation.

Culinary uses

The seeds give a distinctive flavour to baked food like bread, cakes and cookies. Saunf, when added to meatballs or meat loaf, gives an authentic Italian flavour. Sauté fennel seeds with sliced peppers, onion, and sausage for a quick pasta sauce. It is an essential ingredient of the paanch phoron which is used extensively in Bengali, Assamese and Oriya cuisines. It also forms a part of the Chinese five-spice powder. It is also used to spice some of the Rajasthani delicacies like khasta kachori or Bengali sweets like pithe. Saunf is one of the oft used spices in Kashmiri cuisine. So, whether it is yakhni pulao or rogan josh, saunf lends its special sweet aroma.

Fresh fennel bulbs are not used in traditional Indian cooking. Here we use saunf in paneer kababs and in khasta rotis. Most North Indian pickles have generous sprinkling of saunf among other spices. Both fennel and anise are also used in many pork dishes and also to flavour a number of drinks. 

Recommended recipes-

Tomato And Fennel Soup,  Prawn Bruschetta With Lemony Fennel Salad,  Saunf Aloo